Living on Lake Titicaca | Peru's Famous Floating Islands (Our Homestay Experience)

Welcome back to Peru everybody! Yeah, welcome back. We have moved higher up into the Andes from Arequipa now to a height of about 3,800 meters. Yes, which we can feel. Yes, to the town of Puno on the shores of Lake Titicaca, which you can see behind us, which is the highest navigable lake in the world. And we're going to be having a really unique cultural experience here. So we'll be spending one night with a local family out on one of the largest islands on the lake. We'll be having some cultural experience with them. We'll be having meals with them. So it's going to be a really fun and unique experience for both of us, I think. But first we have to get there and there is only one way to do that. So it's time to go and catch a boat. Lake Titicaca is home to the Urus Islands, a series of floating islands made by the Uru people out of Totoro reeds. The first stop of our tour was to visit one of these islands and learn more about the people living there. You can see the islands are made of these crazy reeds, Totoro reeds that they just stack on top of one another, like one this way, one that way, one this way, up to like three meters they said, which is crazy. Below us is just water. There is a family, there is a family. The Urus people are descended from a really ancient culture and they speak the Aymara language, which is really only spoken by like 1 million other people here in Peru and Bolivia and northern Chile. Amazing that they live out here on these islands. I mean, they have solar panels and stuff now, so it's not as crazy isolated as it once was, but it's still pretty isolated. We were then given the chance to go inside one of our host's home to have a look around. Oh, rain, no rain. We were then given a very fond farewell before being taken on a traditional boat ride around the islands. We left the floating Urus islands behind and set out on a three-hour boat journey across Lake Titicaca to Amantani Island. This island is one of the most remote and isolated on the lake, and we'd be spending the rest of the afternoon and the whole night there with the local family. It's so cool. Just made it to our little room. It was a challenge, but it was totally worth it. I think we're like the highest community on the island, about 4,000 meters. But check out this view we got from the room. So amazing. Can't believe we're here just on this tiny remote island in the middle of one of the biggest lakes in the world. So I think the plan is to settle in and have some lunch with the family, vegetarian lunch, which is great. And then apparently there is some football going to be played later, which is going to be interesting at 4,000 meters in hiking boots. And then later on, I think we're going to be going up for a short hike up to the top of the mountain to see the sunset, which is going to be very cool. But yeah, it's definitely time to have some lunch. We are almost done. After a delicious and filling lunch with some amazing views, we all gathered at the local pitch for a game of high altitude football. This was a lot of fun with both locals and tourists joining in, but was probably one of the most tiring things I've ever done. I think playing football at that altitude, probably one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life. That was insane. Like, with that altitude, it's just so difficult to catch your breath. And now we have to climb a mountain. You're all right. You didn't do anything. You just sat and filmed. Yeah, I'm carrying all your stuff now. Yeah, well, I think that's only fair. How high are we going? How high overall? 4,170 something, I think. Yeah. Very high. It's the same as we were in Mexico, Mexico City, when we climbed the volcano. Very similar. Although here, you just don't feel like you're high up at all. Yeah, because you see the lake around you. That makes you feel like you're at sea level. You wouldn't think you were 4,000 meters up. It's not like when you're in the middle of the mountains. No, it feels like you should be, you know, close to sea level, at sea level. Which makes this feeling of out of breathness really, really strange. This island is really beautiful. So this hike is taking us up to some temples, some old Inca temples. Up on the top of the mountains, there's two. One just over there on the other mountain behind us. And we could pick which one we wanted to go to. They said this one was better. But the view! But yeah, the views are insane. What a view from the top. It's amazing, honestly. It's like 360 degree. Everywhere you look is just spectacular. The sun's just about to go down. This place is just so magical, honestly. Otherworldly, you know. We can't believe we're in this like crazy place. I know. So if you ever come to Peru and you're doing this kind of route, make sure you don't skip Puno and Lake Titicaca because it's a must. Yeah, and stay overnight on the island too. Because the Uros Islands are really cool. And you can stay on those as well. You get a more authentic experience, I think, staying here. Because the lodges on the Uros Island are more like upscale and kind of nice now. Designed for tourism. So I think here is a lot, a lot nicer. We're going back down now. We're going to have some dinner. And then there's supposed to be some kind of celebration tonight. Where we're going to do some dancing. I think we'll get the chance to wear their traditional dresses and clothes, which will be exciting. Hopefully we can do that. It gets really cold up here too. So make sure you bring your woolly hats and scarves and yeah. Everything. We slowly made our way down the hill, taking in the incredible views over to Bolivia and enjoying just how peaceful everything felt. We watched the locals play some volleyball before settling down for a delicious home-cooked meal with our host family. Then we got dressed up in the traditional style, ready for our evening celebration. I'm so happy I got the yellow one. Did you get to choose or? No, I was just kidding. You feel like a traditional Peruvian lady now. To be fair, it just feels like I'm about to meet someone here in Bolivia. Because it's like the same thing. The underskirt. And this is the complete look. We had a beautifully made headscarf as well. Looking good. We made our way down in the dock to the main hall where we spent the night enjoying some traditional music and dancing. Good morning guys. And this morning I just wanted to tell you a little bit about what they actually do here on the island and how they live because I don't think we really covered that yesterday. Basically it's just all agriculture here and fishing. All of their own crops like potatoes, carrots, muña. One crop that grows here called oca that only grows here on the island that we tried yesterday in yesterday's lunch. That was really kind of like a potato and a carrot mixed together. Yeah, and then fishing a little bit as well. But I think with the meat they only really eat that in like special occasions it seems because all of our meals so far have been vegetarian. It's just a very very basic way to live. They have chickens and ducks as well just in here. So obviously they eat a lot of eggs and stuff as well. We were talking to our host last night as much as we could in Spanish and he was saying that for them to go back to Puno it's like 30 to 70 soles which is very expensive for these guys because they don't trade any of their vegetables with Puno or anything. Their sole income is tourism so they really only go to Puno when it's absolutely necessary. Pretty much their entire lives are spent here on the island. Maybe once every month, once twice a month they go to Puno just to get the necessities that they need. It's a crazy way to live. It really is so so remote but you get treated to these unbelievable views every day and it's so so peaceful here. Like no outside sound. At night you can see all the stars, the moon, everything. It's just incredible. They also have a primary and a secondary school on the island where kids can go to get educated. We're learning more and more that the kids of the new generation they prefer to go to the city in Puno to get further educated at university and then they prefer to stay there because there's not really a lot for them here. It's kind of like a new age where people are starting to leave these islands. It was the same on the Uras Islands. I really feel quite privileged to have had this experience because you know in 15 to 20 years this might not exist, you might not be able to do this. We sat down for one last meal with our host before leaving their beautiful home making our way back down the hills to the boats. We left Amantani behind and sailed across the lake to the island of Taquile where we had a short but beautiful hike up to the main village. The people who live on Taquile are known for making some of the highest quality textiles in Peru so we couldn't resist taking a look around their artisanal centre on the main square. After that we were treated to a traditional dance in the square where the locals were dressed in some very colourful outfits. We then went on a short walk through the town to a beautiful lunch spot with gorgeous views of the lake. After more delicious traditional food we hiked back down to the main harbour to catch our final boat all the way back to Puno. We had the most amazing time in Puno and staying on Lake Titicaca and it is absolutely not a destination you should skip when visiting Peru. We hope you enjoyed the video and we'll see you on the next one.